U.S. Steel to Restart Granite City Works

“Our Granite City Works facility and employees, as well as the surrounding community, have suffered too long from the unending waves of unfairly traded steel products that have flooded U.S. markets,” said U. S. Steel President and Chief Executive Officer David B. Burritt. “The Section 232 action announced by President Trump last week recognizes the significant threat steel imports pose to our national and economic security. The President’s strong leadership is needed to begin to level the playing field so companies like ours can compete, win and create jobs that support our employees and the communities in which we operate as well as strengthen our national and economic security. We will continue to support our customers with the high-quality products they have come to expect from U. S. Steel.”

President Trump’s proposed 25 percent tariff on steel imports could cost the U.S. auto industry 45,000 jobs, equivalent to almost a third of the entire steel industry’s workforce, according to a study by the Council on Foreign Relations.

The analysis, by Benn Steil and Benjamin Della Rocca, estimated that a 25 percent tariff would increase the price of U.S.-manufactured vehicles by 1.3 percent on average. That, in turn, would lead to a 4 percent drop is U.S. auto sales around the world and a 45,000-person reduction in the auto workforce.

“Given that employment in the U.S. auto industry is vastly higher than in the U.S. steel industry, such job losses would swamp any possible increase in steel employment,” the analysis said.

And even more US job losses if foreign governments slap tariffs on US cars. And other products in retaliation.

What does a real estate con man, with a history of failed businesses, know about international economics? Everyone with valid credentials in this field say this is madness. Look up the Smoot-Hawley Tariff Act of 1930. More than anything else, that's what caused the Great Depression.

"Tariffs won't start a trade war, there's 435 of them in place today to fight trade cheaters," wrote top union boss and AFL-CIO President Richard Trumka. "People may not like how Pres Trump rolled these out, but I applaud him for trying."

"The real trade war is the war on workers - and we've been getting our butts kicked for decades," he added. "Just look at southwestern PA. Targeted tariffs are the best way to start fighting back and hold cheaters accountable."

Josh Bivens, the director of research at the Economic Policy Institute, wrote in an op-ed at the New York Times ahead of Trump's announcement that backlash to the plan is "reflexive anti-Trump sentiment rather than careful economic reasoning."

"The proposed tariffs can provide a countervailing force against these foreign subsidies and protect American metal producers until a comprehensive solution is found," Bivens added. "Am I confident that the Trump administration will back a smart and efficient solution to the larger problem? Not really — but this doesn't mean we shouldn't be happy to have some breathing room to find one."http://www.businessinsider.com/trump-tariffs-conservatives-oppose-afl-trumka-supports-2018-3

art_deco saidAnd even more US job losses if foreign governments slap tariffs on US cars. And other products in retaliation.

What does a real estate con man, with a history of failed businesses, know about international economics? Everyone with valid credentials in this field say this is madness. Look up the Smoot-Hawley Tariff Act of 1930. More than anything else, that's what caused the Great Depression.

Reopening and upgrading the Granite City steel mills could help revitalize and bring much needed jobs to both struggling Granite City and nearby impoverished East St Louis. This could be a major economic win for the USA.

There’s near-universal consensus among both economists and business leaders that Trump’s tariffs on steel and aluminum are a bad idea, and that the wider trade war those tariffs could trigger would be very destructive. But the chances of heading off this policy disaster are small, because this is a quintessential example of Trump being Trump.

In fact, the tariffs are arguably the Trumpiest thing Trump has done so far.

After all, trade (like racism) is an issue on which Trump has been utterly consistent over the years. He has spent decades railing at other countries that, he claims, hurt America by taking advantage of our relatively open markets. And if his views are based on zero understanding of the issues or even of basic facts, well, Trumpism is all about belligerent ignorance, across the board.

But wait, there’s more. There’s a reason we have international trade agreements, and it’s not to protect us from unfair practices by other countries. The real goal, instead, is to protect us from ourselves: to limit the special-interest politics and outright corruption that used to reign in trade policy.

Trumpocrats, however, don’t see corruption and rule by special interests as problems. You could say that the world trading system is, in large part, specifically designed to prevent people like Trump from having too much influence. Of course he wants to wreck it.

Some background: Contrary to what some seem to believe, textbook economics doesn’t say that free trade is win-win for everyone. Instead, trade policy involves very real conflicts of interest. But these conflicts of interest are overwhelmingly between groups within each country, rather than between countries. For example, a trade war against the European Union would make America as a whole poorer, even if the E.U. didn’t retaliate (which it would). It would, however, benefit some industries that happen to face stiff European competition.

And here’s the thing: The small groups that benefit from protectionism often have more political influence than the much larger groups that are hurt. That’s why Congress used to routinely pass destructive trade bills, culminating in the infamous Smoot-Hawley Tariff Act of 1930: Enough members of Congress were bought off, one way or another, to enact legislation that almost everyone knew was bad for the nation as a whole.

In 1934, however, F.D.R. introduced a new approach to trade policy: reciprocal agreements with other countries, in which we exchanged reduced tariffs on their exports for reduced tariffs on ours. This approach introduced a new set of special interests, exporters, who could offer countervailing power against the influence of special interests seeking protection.